As a first step for the conduct of local body polls in Puducherry, the government has constituted a committee on Wednesday to carry out the delimitation of wards on the basis of Census 2011 and provide reservation for the polls. 

A notification has been issued to the  delimitation committee, secretary of local administration T Srikanth told Express.

“We will complete all tasks at the earliest in accordance with the High Court order,” he said.

The four-member delimitation committee is  headed by retired director of higher education G Paneerselvam and other members include commissioner of Puducherry municipality, S Rajamanicam, retired deputy director, V Nagarajan and director of local administration department A S P S Ravi Praksh. The panel  will make recommendations for the delimitation of municipal and village wards with regard to the population and determine the total number of reserved seats.

After completion of the delimitation process and reservation, the committee will give recommendations to the government, based on which the government will issue notification and forward it to the State Election Commission (SEC) to proceed with the Civic elections to the Municipalities and Commune Panchayats in the UT.

In the Union Territory there are 120 municipal wards in the five municipalities and 98 village wards in Puducherry and Karaikal region. The previous delimitation was done in 1995 and since then the population has grown manifold, delimitation was required for the conduct of elections.

On December 13,2012  Madras High Court had directed the Puducherry government to immediately obtain the 2011 census data preferably within two months and then carry out the delimitation and reservation process in the wards. Though the High Court had not fixed any time frame for delimitation process, Supreme Court had directed the Puducherry government to complete the delimitation of municipal and commune panchayat wards within two months after getting the census data, while disposing of a special leave petition (SLP)  filed by V Perumal, state secrertary of CPM.  Thereafter the SEC has been directed by the  High Court to notify polls with the updated data and hold the elections within three months from the date of the notification.

However, four months have already passed in getting the Census data. The delimitation process may require good time to complete it. There are statutory requirements of the delimitation process, necessitating calling for objections which may consume some time. The previous delimitation that began on June 1994 took a year to complete, said official sources.

Even the reservation for Backward Class (BC) may take time as the data pertaining to it is not available in the Census report. The delimitation panel will have to depend on the  Thangamani Commission’s report or work out other ways to get the data for providing reservation, sources added.

Moreover, the government is facing financial crunch which may be a deterrent to the holding of the polls. Chief Minister N Rangasamy has sought the release of more than `240 crore due to local bodies in the UT as grants to the local bodies.

The last civic body elections were conducted in 2006, after 38 years based on the High Court direction. The term of the elected bodies ended on July 13, 2010 and since then political parties have been demanding the conduct of polls.